Poll: BP's image improving after oil spill; fears of seafood persist

View full size(AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)An unidentified employee sits in the bridge of the the Helix Q4000, as it performs the static kill operation, at the site of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill in Gulf of Mexico, off the coast of Louisiana, Tuesday, Aug. 3, 2010. An AP poll suggests BP's image is improving, but two-thirds of the public still hold an unfavorable view of the company.

WASHINGTON -- BP's image, which took an ugly beating after
the Gulf oil spill, is recovering since the company sealed the well,
though the oil giant's approval level is still anything but robust. A
majority of Americans still aren't convinced it is safe to eat seafood
from parts of the Gulf or swim in its waters, a new AP poll shows.

Politically,
President Barack Obama's rating on handling the nation's worst oil
spill has nudged up to about 50 percent, the poll indicated. Fewer
people now think the spill is a major national issue, and more support
increased drilling in U.S. coastal waters than oppose it.

Safety remains a worry.

"Normally,
I would go to the casinos and eat seafood, but now I'm going to be kind
of skeptical of eating," said Samuel Washington, 44, who lives in
Norfolk, Va., but also owns a home in Ocean Springs, Miss. "My biggest
concern is whether or not they are really testing all the affected
areas."

Approval for Obama's handling of the mess has risen from
45 percent in June, while BP's marks have more than doubled -- from 15
percent to a still lackluster 33 percent. Some 66 percent of those
surveyed continue to disapprove of BP's performance, down from a
whopping 83 percent in June.

More than half, 54 percent, said they
weren't confident that it is safe yet to eat seafood from the spill
areas, and 55 percent said they weren't confident that the beaches in
the affected areas were safe for swimming.

Still, just 60 percent
of those surveyed called the spill an important issue now, down from 87
percent in June. Only 21 percent said it would affect them and their
families a great deal or a lot in the next year, down from 40 percent in
June.

"At least it did get capped. It could have been done a
whole lot sooner," said Deshon Jenkins, 33, of Arlington, Texas, who
works in shipping and warehousing and was among those who said the spill
would "not at all" affect his life.

Shrimper Patrick Hue of
Buras, La., said BP has been hard at work. "You can't deny that," he
said. "They got boats out here, they got people working. ... I guess
they're cleaning up what they're supposed to clean up."

Between
June and the week that the Associated Press-GfK poll was conducted, Aug.
11-16, BP sealed the well, its gaffe-prone chief Tony Hayward lost his
job and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said most of
the oil had dissolved, dispersed or been removed.

Those
developments probably contributed to the improved public attitude,
though the NOAA findings have been challenged by some ocean researchers
as far too optimistic.

Whatever the case, it is clear is that the
spilling of over 100 million gallons of crude oil into the Gulf no
longer looms as a commanding political issue for voters heading toward
midterm elections in November.

Voters are far more concerned about the economy, jobs and bulging federal deficits.

The
poll showed that 48 percent favor increasing drilling for oil and gas
in coastal waters, up from 45 percent in June. Some 36 percent said they
opposed increased drilling, down from 41 percent. The rest didn't have
an opinion.

The spill began on April 20 when the offshore drilling
rig Deepwater Horizon, leased by well owner BP and operated by
Transocean Ltd., caught fire and sank, killing 11 workers. Only the
deliberate dumping of oil by Iraq in the 1991 Gulf War ranks in the
world as a larger spill.

For weeks, the spill in the Gulf of
Mexico riveted the public's attention as oil and gas spewed relentlessly
from the ocean floor, fouling marshes and beaches and leading to the
shutdown of fisheries.

Obama, who just prior to the spill had
called for an increase in offshore drilling, struggled to demonstrate
leadership and fend off GOP attacks suggesting the crisis was his
equivalent of Hurricane Katrina.

As repeated attempts to cap the
well failed, Obama expressed compassion with Gulf Coast residents and
anger toward BP, delivered a prime-time address on the issue and imposed
a drilling moratorium. He successfully pressed BP to set up a $20
billion liability fund.

Fishing and commercial shrimping activity
has been resuming as the drilling of two relief wells, begun in May,
nears completion. The first one to reach the damaged well will seal it
from below with mud and cement. The flow of oil was cut off from the top
in mid-July.

Mike Voisin, who runs a Louisiana-based oyster
harvesting and processing business, said despite waves of anger directed
at BP by the public, the company has succeeded in working well with
local communities. "Did they make mistakes? Sure. Should they have been
better prepared? Yes," Voisin said. He estimated his business took a 50
percent hit "but we'll work our way through it."

"With more than
half of the American people still worried about swimming in the Gulf or
eating its seafood, we must be vigilant about monitoring the spill and
its continued effects," said Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass. Markey heads a
House panel on energy and the environment that is holding a hearing
Thursday on seafood safety and where the oil went.

The AP-GfK Poll
was conducted by GfK Roper Public Affairs and Corporate Communications.
It involved landline and cell phone interviews with 1,007 adults
nationwide and had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4.5
percentage points.